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Wednesday, 23 June 2010

I am more than just pleased with the ChessexBattlemats that I have bought to use at COW. Now that they have had some time to lay flat for a few hours, all the creases have dropped out. In addition, the vinyl they are printed on is heavy enough to stay flat and to 'stick' to the cloth I lay on my wargames table to protect its surface whilst I am using it.

The Battlemats come in a pale stone colour and they are printed with 1-inch squares on one side and 1-inch hexes on the other.

It is possible to draw on the Battlemats with water-based non-permanent OHP pens, which means that some terrain features (e.g. rivers, roads) can be drawn on and then wiped off after the battle has been fought.

I like these Battlemats, and I am sure that they will be of use to me for some time to come.

10 comments:

guedbA cautionary note: I've used Chessex battle mats - and some other makes as well - and they all work well with dry wipe markers...but... make sure you clean the mat thoroughly after every game session. If you leave the marker on the mat for too long it will stain plastic.

Also the dry wipe ink isn’t dry wipe after a few days and is a nightmare to remove. It is possible to clean the mat, but it will take a bucket of chemical cleaners and a lot of elbow grease.

Chessex at least used to make (and hopefully still does) a very interesting mat.

It had "alternating squares". That is, it had a row of squares, then each subsequent row would be offset by 50%.

Thus every other row would be the same as the row before the previous one. The net result was a surface of "squares" but movement would be similar to hexes . . . with diagonals no longer warping things out-of-whack.

I too have a chessex mat and they're great. A word of warning though. Don't leave your OPC pen markings on for too long (more than a couple of weeks) as the ink does sink in eventually and the marks are a devil to get out.

Be careful. Even OHP pens will leave hard to move marks if left on for too long. I ran a solo game over a 3 week period and used good lumocolor pens - they still left some marks that were a devil to move.

I did not know that Chessex made Battlemats with offset squares. They did not appear on any of the websites I visited and may therefore only be available in the US. This would be a great shame as several of the RED SQUARE group of wargames rules written by Richard Brooks use offset squares exactly for the reasons you mention; they are a squared grid with the advantages of a hexed grid but none of the disadvantages.

I am glad that you like the photograph. I tried to show what both grids looked like as well as giving some idea of how figures looked on them.

You are absolutely right; green would have been very useful ... but they don't seem to make them in that colour, which is a great pity. However, for a dusty setting they are great.

COW looms on the horizon and I am still getting stuff ready for it. My plan is to have all my ‘toys’ packed and ready to go by Monday of next week at the latest so that I don’t have to hurry around at the last minute.

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The First Rule of Wargaming and the Spirit of the Wargame

The First Rule:

‘Nothing can be done contrary to what could or would be done in actual war.'

- From 'The Rules of the Naval War Game' by Fred T Jane

The Spirit of the Wargame:

‘Wargames are played, for the most part, without the supervision of an umpire. The game relies on the integrity of the individual players to show consideration for other players and to abide by the rules. All players should conduct themselves in a disciplined manner, demonstrating courtesy and sportsmanship at all times, irrespective of how competitive they may be. This is the spirit of the wargame.’

- Adapted from 'The Spirit of the Game' in 'The Rules of Golf' as published by the R&A Ltd.

About Me

I have been wargaming for as long as I can remember. One of the first toys that I was bought was a wooden fort that was garrisoned by assorted lead soldiers ... and I have never looked back!
The first wargames book I bought was CHARGE! (although I had taken out [and repeatedly read] Donald Featherstone's WAR GAMES book beforehand [and many thanks to John Curry for republishing it!]).
My first 20mm figures were the good old Airfix Guards Infantry and Band (in shocking pink!), soon followed by others as they were released, and by 1968, when I bought my first metal Hinton Hunt 20mm figures, I had a large collection of World War II figures, tanks, guns, and aircraft.
I was a founder member of WARGAME DEVELOPMENTS and have been the treasurer and membership secretary ever since. I have also organised – along with Tim Gow - the annual conference (COW – Conference of Wargamers) for the past ten years.
My main interests are wargaming any wars from 1850 onwards, although I have a special interest in Colonial, the Spanish Civil War, and World War II wargaming.
I also have a special interest in wargames that use square or hex grids for movement and weapon ranges.